In a snowy small town in England just before Christmas, handyman Christian thinks the world has ended – his parents are still getting used to his being gay and have disinvited him to their Christmas. Former waiter David has just been fired and is still getting used to the fact that his useless, cheating, money-grabbing, waste-of-space boyfriend has just dumped him. Their mutual friend Cathy steps in and invites the two strangers to a non-family Christmas at the flat she shares with Tony.

With Cathy’s organizational skills and enthusiasm, these four spend Christmas together, making the best of it and getting to know each other. A spark of attraction clearly brings David and Christian closer, and spending the festive season together may be just what these two refugees need to calm their troubled souls.

But the past still haunts them both and threatens to be their undoing. Is love enough to overcome the burdens they bear? Can they find a happy Christmas together after all?

Three things about Liam – there are five more on the website and one is a lie:

He lives, with his partner and cats, where east London ends and becomes nine-carat-gold- highlights-and-fake-tan-west-Essex.

He was born in Hampshire with two club feet (look it up, it’s not nice) and problem ears, needing grommets: this meant he was in plaster from toe to groin until he was two, and had to swim with a cap and olive oil soaked lamb’s wool over his ears – olive oil bought from a health food shop, before it was sold by supermarkets.

He started writing when he was 14: sat in French lessons during a French exchange trip, for want of anything better to do, he wrote pen portraits about his French exchange’s teachers. He wrote for his school’s creative writing magazine and still writes a diary every day.

To enter, leave a comment stating that you are entering the contest. Contest closes 7 pm CST, Friday, December 6.

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I am entering the competition. I am also deeply concerned that Liam maybe my neighbour and I don’t know, as I also live where London meets Essex … and I do get a strange black cat visiting from time to time (because the 10 cats I have are too stupid to run it out of the house!)

Hi everyone, I just wanted to say, thanks all for commenting, it’s such a great response and I’m really pleased you’re all interested in reading this little story I wrote 🙂
Petra Bond – we may well be neighbours, although neither of our cats are black. One is a mackeral tabby, and the other is piebald (white with black spots).
Good luck everyone, and I hope to be back here soon with my next release. Thanks to Chris for hosting.
Liam Livings